Hildegard and the hop

5 8 months ago

Once upon a time grasses, berries and the wide scale of spices were used in order to brew beer. Written memories from the end of the first millennium usually mention a certain type of spice mixture called gruit that was a generally used ingredient during the course of beer brewing. It frequently contained marshy plants like marshy myrtle or wild rosemary but there were also local versions of it. In rural breweries of Gotland (which is now a large Swedish island and province in the Baltic Sea) before the starting of fermenting the tools were fertilized with tea brewed from hops.

That would seem that this buttresses the theory that hops originally were used in order to avoid infections (due to these diseases beer would have become sour or too bitter). From recollections of the 8th-century hops were frequently raised near to the abbeys, even though its purpose wasn't initially beer making.

The first unquestionable proof of hop using during beer brewing can be found in the writing of Saint Hildegard (1098-1179). Hildegard von Bingen was the Mother Superior of the Benedictine abbey of Rupertsberg next to Bingen, not far away from the town of Mainz. Hildegard didn't mention that hop belongs to the family of hemps but she underlined that its usage is highly advisable in the course of brewing. Surely, in Hildegard von Bingen we can effortlessly honor a modern-day heroine. Contrary to the prevalent superstition she interested in topics that weren't popular amongst nuns. Not just because she was engaged in brewing beer, but because she was the pioneer who've written about the female orgasm as well.